Cross reactions between six pathogenic bacteria and their antisera

Agglutination, SDS-PAGE, Western-blot and ELISA methods were used to analyze the cross-reactions between Vibrio anguillarum, V. harveyi, V. alginolyticus, V. paraheamolyticus, Edwardsiella tarda, and Pseudomonas fluorescens with their anti-sera. The V.paraheamolytius, V.horveyi, V.alginlyticus and E. tarda were presented by Institute of Hydrobiology, The Chinese Academy of Sciences. The cultivated temperature and time were 26 ℃ and 24 h, respectively. The results show that there are high-level cross-reactions in the same category and low-level or even no cross-reactions between different ones. By western-blot method, it shows that in many protein belts having antigenicity hold the same molecule weight, especially in the same category. Most of the vibrios have the protein bands with molecule weights of 135.6 kD and 121.5 kD which can react with Vibrio horveyi antiserum, 96.5 kD, 48.4 kD, 39.2 kD and 34.9 kD with V.alginolyticus antiserum, 55.1 kD with V. paraheamolyticus antiserum, but these protein belts can't react with the sera of the other two categories. If the cross proteins are the specific epitopes possessed by vibrios, they could be used to produce the subunit vaccine against vibriosis of aquatic animals.